Cover of sheet music entitled "Silver
Palace Cars," by H. M. Higgins, with words by R. F. Hoyt, commemorating
the fine sleeping cars designed by Theodore Tuttle Woodruff, who patented the convertible
car seats which turned the cars from day into sleeping berths by night. Words
printed on document read "Silver Palace Car, Songs and Chorus by H. M.
Higgins. Words by R. F Hoyt. Published by H. M. Higgins, 122 South
Clark St., Chicago. Entered according to Act of Congress of the Year
1868 by H. M. Higgins in the Clerk's Office of the Dist. Court for the North
Dist. of Ill." Woodruff established the T.T. Woodruff & Company,
with Andrew Carnegie, and by 1858 the cars were in service with eight
of the midwestern railroads. The cars were so popular that they even
wrote music such as this about the Silver Palace Cars that ran on the
Central Pacific. In 1862 Woodruff, as primary stockholder, with his brother
Jonah as manager, organized the The Central Transportation Company. In
1864 Woodruff assigned his patent interests to another stockholder and retired
from the sleeping car business. Then in 1870 Central Transportation assigned
its patent rights to the Pullmans Palace Car Company, after expensive litigation
in a patent infringement suit. In the Dec. 1888 Issue of the Official
Railway Guide, the railroad industry was startled by an announcement
that Union Car Company would begin operating sleeping and parlor cars over
15,000 miles of railroad. (Union
had incorporated to obtain control of Woodruff and the Mann Boudoir Car Company,
and the two companies operated 34 cars in the East, South and Midwest.) Two
months later Union Palace was purchased by Pullmans Palace Car Company for
$2.5 million, but Union was dissolved in 1899. Frame measures 8 1/2" x
10 1/2". Document is lightly tinted in shades of blue, gray, and
red/brown/burgundy on an ecru background. —Murkett